Last episode you heard the riveting story of Luther Burbank, plant breeder extraordinary.

In the episode we mentioned a guy named David Fairchild.

Burbank was a plant wizard.

Fairchild was a plant explorer.

And unsurprisingly, they were buddies.

Fairchild often sent Burbank little envelopes of seeds

from his travels.

And both of them have been almost forgotten, the fact that they shaped what we eat today.

We're bringing you this encore episode about Fairchild. Thanks to our friends at American Express.

We'll be back with a brand new episode next week and for now here's David Fairchild's story enjoy

I heard Fairchild's name at National Geographic one day someone described him as an adventurer botanist.

And I had never heard anyone have that title before, and it sounded so illustrious that I dug deeper and deeper and found his journals and his travel memos and his love letters that painted a portrait of his adventures all over the world.

That's Daniel Stone and the person he's talking about is David Fairchild,

one of the most interesting and important people behind the food on our plates

that you've never heard of.

But Dan did hear about him and he wrote a book about him.

It's called The Food Explorer, The True Adventures of the Globetrotting Botanist who

transformed what America eats.

You're listening to Gasterbod, the podcast that looks at food

through the lens of science and history.

I'm Cynthia Graber.

And I'm Nicola Twilly.

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